Data is tough to come by in the African telecommunications market. The options are annual ITU report, demand-side releases (from a government ministry or a regulatory body), telecom operators’ annual reports, expensive market reports from sources like Budde Comm, or the rare demand-side questionnaire carried-out by researchers on the ground.

The ITU statistics lack focus and their perils have been discussed ad nauseam. There are simply too many operator annual reports to sift through. We cover the demand-side questionnaires as they become available. What’s left to cover are reports from the telecoms operators and government ministries.

East African regulators have actively published datasets as of late. Kenya’s CCK and Tanzania’s TCRA both recently released Internet and mobile subscription numbers from Q3 2011. So, with the suggestion of Wayan Vota of ICTWorks in mind, we attempted to discover what information each African telecommunications regulator releases.

Fortunately, most nations have an operational regulator, even if that regulator is not yet independent of the government. And, most regulators are expected to present an annual report to the government and to the market. In most cases, an annual report from 2009 or 2010 was available (and was released the following year). These reports often cover the number of citizens on the internet, a breakdown of how users access the internet (institution/household/individual/cafe), the number of mobile subscribers, type of internet (mobile wireless/fixed wireless/VSAT/cable), and growth over time. Some list a subscriber break down by operator. Most nations, however, do not have such current or robust data. Still, any data is better than no data. The table below lists the most recent public data made available by each national telecom regulator.

Most recent data from African telecoms regulators:

Country	Regulator	Most Recent Data	Site Last Updated/Notes
Algeria	Autorite de Regulation des Postes et Telecommunications (ARPT)	2009	jan 2012, modern site
Angola	Institut Angolias des Communications (INACOM)	2009 (partial data)	oct 2010
Benin	Transitory Authority for the Regulation of Posts and Telecommunications (ATRPT)	2009	2012
Botswana	Botswana Telecommunications Authority (BTA)	2010	may 2010
Burkina Faso	Autorite Nationale de Regulation des Telecommunications (ARTEL)	2009	feb 2012, new cyber security section
Burundi	Agence de Régulation et de Contrôle des Télécommunications (ARCT)	2008	under construction, data from TeleGeography link
Cameroon	Agence de Regulation des Telecommunications (ART)	2006	jan 2012
Cape Verde	National Communications Agency (ANAC)	2008 (partial)	feb 2012
Central African Republic	Agence chargée de la Régulation des Télécommunications (ART)		no site
Chad	Office Tchadien de Regulation des Telecoms (OTRT)	2002	2005
Comoros	Autorité Nationale de Régulation des Tics (ANRTIC)		dec 2011, some tech issues
Congo	L’Agence de Régulation des Postes et Communications Electroniques (ARPCE)	2011 (partial)	2012, founded 2009, very modern, Facebook
Cote D’Ivoire	Agence des Telecommunications de Cote d’Ivoire (ATCI)	2011 (video)	oct 2011, under construction
Dem. Rep. of Congo	Autorite de Regulation de la Poste et des Telecommunications du Congo (ARPTC)		not found
Djibouti	Ministere de la Communication et de la Culture, chargé des Postes et Télécommincations, Porte-Parole du Gouvernement (MCC-PT)	2011	dec 2011, monthly data!
Egypt	National Telecom Regulatory Authority (NTRA)	2009	feb 2012
Equatorial Guinea	Órgano Regulador de las Telecomunicaciones (ORTEL)	2011 (partial)	jan 2011
Eritrea	Communications Department		no site
Ethiopia	Ethiopian Telecommunications Agency (ETA)		2009
Gabon	Agence de Regulation des Telecommunications (ARTEL)		won’t connect
Gambia	Gambian Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA)		2011
Ghana	National Communications Authority (NCA)	2008	2010
Guinea	Regulatory Auhtority for Posts and Telecommunications (ARPT)	2010	feb 2012
Guinea-Bissau	Ministry of Telecommunications		no site
Kenya	CCK – Communications Commission of Kenya	Q3 2011	feb 2012, good data, Facebook
Lesotho	Lesotho Communications Authority (LCA)	2010	2011
Liberia	Liberia Telecommunications Authority (LTA)	2010	feb 2012
Libya	n/a	n/a	n/a
Madagascar	Office Malagasy d’etudes et de Regulation des Telecommunications (OMERT)	2008	mar 2009
Malawi	Communications Regulatory Authority (MACRA)	2010	jan 2012
Mali	Comité de régulation des télécommnunications du Mali (CRT)	2010	oct 2011
Mauritania	Autorite de Regulation (AR)	2010	jan 2012
Mauritius	Information and Communication Technologies Authority (ICTA)	2009	feb 2012
Mayotte	ARCEP (France)
Morocco	Agence Nationale de Réglementation des Télécommunications (ANRT)	2010	2012
Mozambique	Instituto Nacional das Communicacoes de Mozambique	2007	feb 2012
Namibia	Communications Regulatory Authority of Namibia (CRAN)	2010	feb 2012, Facebook
Niger	L’Autorite de Regulation Multisectorielle (ARM)	2006	jul 2011
Nigeria	Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC)	2011	2012, Facebook, good data
Reunion	ARCEP (France)
Rwanda	Regulatory Agency for Public Utility Services of Rwanda (RURA)	2011	2012
Sao Tome And Principe	ARCEP (France)
Senegal	Agence de Régulation des Télécommunications et des Postes (ARTP)	2009	oct 2011
Seychelles	n/a	n/a	n/a
Sierra Leone	National Telecommunications Commission (NATCOM)		late 2011
Somalia	n/a	n/a	n/a
South Africa	Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (ICASA)	2011	2012
St.Helena	Ofcom (UK)?
South Sudan	Ministry of Telecommunications & Postal Services		2009
Sudan	National Telecommunications Corporation (NTC)	2011	nov 2011
Swaziland	Swaziland Posts & Telecommunications Corporation (SPTC)	2011	2011
Tanzania	Tanzania Communications Regulatory Authority (TCRA)	2012	2012, good data
Togo	Autorite de Reglementation des Secteurs de Postes et Telecommunications (ART&P)	2010	2012
Tunisia	l’Instance Nationale des Télécommunications de Tunisie (INTT)	2010	feb 2012, Twitter
Uganda	Uganda Communications Commission (UCC)	2011	2012
Western Sahara	n/a	n/a	n/a
Zambia	Zambia Information and Communications Technology Authority (ZICTA)	2012	feb 2012, Twitter
Zimbabwe	Postal & Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (POTRAZ)	Q3 2011*	2011, official stats from TechZim post

 

Noteworthy insights:

• No telecoms regulator: Libya, Seychelles, Somalia, Western Sahara
• No regulatory website found: Central African Republic, DRC, Eritrea, Guinea-Bissau
• No data found: Comoros, Ethiopia, Gambia, Sierra Leone, South Sudan
• 2011 data is available from regulators in: Congo, Ivory Coast, Equatorial Guinea, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe
• Social media presence: Zambia, Tunisia, Nigeria, Namibia, Kenya, Congo
• The most outdated data: Cameroon (2006), Chad (2002), Niger (2006)
• Burkina Faso’s ARTEL has recently added a section of the site devoted to cyber security efforts.
• Djibouti’s MCC-PT surprisingly has monthly Internet user data through October 2011.
• The majority of regulator websites (37 of the 49 that exist) have been updated in the past year.

Even if insights exist at the top, they are usually delayed by a full year – tough considering the extreme growth rate of Internet services. Data on the use of ICTs by individuals will be limited for years to come. Although more countries are conducting their own surveys of individual ICT trends, resources are still limited.

In the meantime, we plan on searching individual communications ministry websites for additional telecoms data. Most African nations have at least one government ministry dedicated to communications. The question is whether the ministries source their own data or if they adapt annual reports from regulators and operators.

The list of regulators and their URLs can be found at Africa & Middle East Telecom Week.